"Gustav Hasvord. The Short-Timers " - читать интересную книгу автора

I tell him to go to hell.
Fifty-six days and a wake-up.


In the morning we wake up inside the MAC-V compound, a white two-story
building with bullet-pocked walls. The compound has been enclosed behind a
wall of sandbags and concertina wire.
We gather up our gear and prepare to leave while a light colonel reads
a statement made by the military mayor of Hue. The statement is a denial
that there is looting in Hue and a warning that looters will be shot on
sight. A dozen civilian war correspondents sit on the deck, wiping sleep
from their eyes, half-listening, yawning. Then the light colonel adds a
personal comment. Someone has awarded a Purple Heart to a big white goose
that got wounded while the compound was under attack. The light colonel
feels that the civilian correspondents do not understand that war is serious
business.
Outside, I point to a wasted NVA hanging in the wire. "Was is serious
business, son, and this is our gross national product." I kick the corpse,
triggering panic in the maggots in the hollow eye sockets and in the
grinning mouth and in each of the bullet holes in his chest. "Gross?"
Rafter Man kneels down to get a better look. "Yes, he is confirmed."
A CBS camera crew appears, surrounded by star-struck grunts who strike
combat-Marine poses, pretending to be what they are. They all want Walter
Cronkite to meet their sisters. In white short-sleeved shirts the CBS
cameramen hurry off to photograph death in living color.

I stop a master sergeant. "Top, we want to get into the shit."
The master sergeant is writing on a piece of yellow paper on a
clipboard. He doesn't look up, but jerks his thumb over his shoulder.
"Across the river. One-Five. Get a boat ride by the bridge."
"One-Five? Outstanding. Thanks, Top."
The master sergeant walks away, writing on the yellow paper. He ignores
four skuzzy grunts who run into the compound, each man holding up one corner
of a poncho. On the poncho is a dead Marine. The grunts are screaming for a
corpsman and when they put the poncho down, very gently, a pool of dark
blood pours out onto the concrete deck.
Rafter Man and I hurry down to the River of Perfumes. We talk to a
baby-faced Navy ensign who souvenirs us a ride on a Vietnamese gunboat
ferrying reinforcements to the Vietnamese Marines.
As we skim down the river Rafter Man asks, "Are these guys any good?"
I nod. "The best the Arvins got. They're not as tough as the Korean
Marines, though. The ROK's are so hard that they got muscles in their shit.
The Blue Dragon Brigade. I was on an op with them down by Hoi An."
A shot pops from the shore. The bullet buzzes over.
The gunboat crew opens up with a fifty-caliber machine gun and a forty
mike-mike cannon.
Rafter Man watches with joy in his eyes as the bullets knock up thin
stalks of water along the river bank. He holds his piece at port arms, first
to fight.